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The Monk’s Prayer was originally part of a music-theatre work The Unending Rose, written for the Electroacoustic Cabaret in 1987. One of the characters in the piece is a monk, who “kneels at a prayer desk and intones a long prayer on a bass flute, which spreads like ripples over water”. The “ripples over water” are implemented by a complex delay system (described below). The “prayer” consists of a long melody with a set of alternative paths, or decorations. The melody is repeated six times, while the player chooses diVerent routes through these alternative paths.
Later I extracted the monk’s music as a separate piece. It is intended for bass flute in C, but may also be played on alto flute in G.
Lawrence Casserley
January 2003
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